Christian Textbook ‘Teaches the Controversy’ About Moon Landing ‘Conspiracy,’ Butchers English Language in the Process (Images)

Many have asked me why I seem to immediately jump on this sort of story. I have been accused of having a vendetta against Christianity, of being closed-minded, and called things I didn’t know existed. The truth is that I grew up a very devout Christian at evangelical churches. I bought what they were selling.

Part of this has to do with my deep immersion in Christian education from the third grade through the ninth (when I finally got out of the Bubble). Basically, since Science class did not teach science, I realized quickly as I began to make friends outside the “bubble” that I was waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay behind in science — and pretty much everything else.

As someone who has experience with Christian education, I can say that I am not surprised by finding this on the interwebs. In my youth, I attended schools that “taught” from both A BEKA and ACE curriculum and often found myself confronted with claims that humans and dinosaurs competed for real estate, the earth is just about 10,000 years old, and that homosexuality has been scientifically proven to be a choice.

I was a victim of something that went well beyond abstinence-only education (I didn’t even know what sperm was until I was 12, and my 9 year old neighbor explained it to me.) We were told that holding hands can lead to pregnancy and damnation (This is not a joke.)

You can laugh, but it took me years to undo the damage that was done with me. I was behind academically when compared to the civilized world–not through a lack of study, but through a lack of education. When Bible class is Bible class, and English class is Bible class, and Science class is Bible class, and Math class is Bible class, one is almost certain to be lacking in many of the fundamental building blocks of education.

Something positively horrifying to anyone not expecting it came the interwebs and found itself on my screen today:

“On July 20th, 1969 the Apollo 11 landed on the moon. The world was really amazed because man walked on the moon for the first time. The spacecraft carried three astronauts, Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Edwin Aldrin. They collected many rocks and took many photos. Then they returned to the Earth. It was a great achievement for humans.

However, some scientists didn’t believe the Apollo 11 landed on the moon. One scientist kept asking himself, “How can the flag be fluttering when there is no wind on the moon? The Apollo 11’s landing was fake.” Other scientists agree with him. They also argue that the technology wasn’t good enough for man to step on the moon.

Did man really go to the moon? Nobody knows whether the Apollo 11 really went to the moon or not.“

I remember something similar from my time in Christian school. It is possible that this is A BEKA, but I am not certain if this is the exact material with which I suffered in my childhood, but this does accurately represent what is taught.

“Teach the controversy” is a phrase heard often from conservatives. Teach that–yes, some theorize we have landed on the moon but that many scientists disagree with the claim…but note the additional detail provided to the “no.” section.

Please also note that a girl is on the “affirmative” side. Given the tradition of gender-biased education in Christian education, the graphic might as well just indicate that we did not land on the moon. Women, to those who would include such “educational” material in a curriculum, belong in the kitchen, not offering opinions.

The next time you hear that “both sides” should be taught–the next time someone says that we need to “teach the controversy,” think of this.

About John Prager

John Prager is an unfortunate Liberal soul who lives uncomfortably in the middle of a Conservative hellscape and likes to refer to himself as an "island of reason in a sea of insanity."
While he is not a fan of politicians, period, he has developed a deep-seated hatred for the bigotry, fear mongering, and lies of the Right Wing.
John also works as a counselor at one of Barry Soetoro's FEMA re-education camps and as a HAARP weather control coordinator.
John's life's aspiration is to rule the world with an iron fist, or find that sock he's been looking for.
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This so-called text book has no more to do with Christianity than it has to do with science. Sounds like just nutcase conspiracy theories for the fringes of society, in this case forced on the children of such misfits.

Yes, the moon landing was faked – but two people getting kicked out of a garden for listening to a talking snake, necessitating a man being nailed to a tree 4,000 years later so his dad doesn’t have to roast us alive for all eternity – that’s real.

Psychopaths.

Rikki_Tikki_Taalik

I searched by image and found a number of pages using this photo. The best I can tell is this image has been floating around for three days.

The only place I can find with a description is a website (tumblr account) called “Thanks, Textbooks. with the caption “Found in an English textbook from South Korea.”

It seems to be the originator as all other the posts seem to link back to that tumblr account.

Debbie Tucker-Smith

Another post about this has a librarian who found the publisher of this book – she saysit’s part of a ‘series published by Evan-Moor’. Evan-Moor link is here: Evan-moor.com is also promoted by Exodus publishers (and I am sure many others). Exodus publishers looks to be promoter of Christian books. This text is absolutely typical of ‘biased’ Christian texts found in many southern schools. Horrible. Everything is twisted to fit the biblical teachings and biases.

G Evans

Wow. I did ACE curriculum until the 4th grade, which was my first year in the public school system that I was always told was so inferior. I remember seeing kids in my class doing multiplication and I thought it was some sort of magic.

Education was a distant second priority.

http://twitter.com/deuZige deuZige (@deuZige)

I feel that education should be governed by the government and that government and religion should be separated. This should therefore not be possible to occur as the governing of education includes guarding that what is taught to the children and students is real knowledge and skills that they will benefit from. This obviously has the exact opposite purpose. It isn’t even about landing on the moon or not, but about teaching that no matter how much people disagree with what the church tells you to be true or how official the message seems to be, even if it is from your government,,,, It should be viewed with hostility and presumed to be intended to harm you in some way…

Nah,education with any influence by any religion should be forbidden, and ruthlessly eradicated from humanity!

If you then still believe and want to convince others your beliefs are the only truths there are then you can do so at home, online, in the nudy bar or at the top of mount everest for all i care. Anyone then still buying that crap would not do well in education anyway and maybe better off not having their head cluttered with science and free will and all that.

http://www.imallwrite.com drewbai

These are the same people that believe The Flintstones was a documentary

Sparkytdg

Somethings are so sad they are funny… and so funny they hurt.

http://facebook sotamis

It starts incorrectly also, Apollo 11 circled the moon. Never landed on it.

jedipunk

Apollo 11 landed on the moon.

http://gravatar.com/dchesler dchesler

If “Apollo 11″ means “the spacecraft that carried 3 astronauts”, it did not land on the moon. If “Apollo 11″ means the mission, the mission achieved moon landing.

So why did the flag appear to be fluttering?

Bob Cull

The “fluttering” has been explained many times, Dcheler. The flag had a wire across the top to hold it extended, when the pole was planted in the ground the vibrations translated to the wire which vibrated giving the APPEARANCE of fluttering, there was no actual fluttering. Denying science is a sign of ignorance usually, sometimes it is just plain stupidity and that, unfortunately cannot be fixed.

http://gravatar.com/dchesler dchesler

Suggesting an unsolved mystery when it was a designed feature, and leaving the reader wondering, is very bad writing.

Engaging the reader with a question works. Tell a story if they want and _open_ with that, “How could a flag appear to flutter when the moon has no atmosphere? Some people claim this is evidence that the moon landing was faked.” but don’t leave the reader wondering.

(My mentor would say don’t even do that. He says never put in a picture of how not to do it, because the reader will remember that picture and do it, forgetting the big red X and the picture right next to it of the right way. He’s probably right.)

If they must leave a question (a la Cafe Mom) how about “Why do some people continue to claim the landing was faked?”

What is that “Weather or not”? Are the authors that bad, or I am too optimistic to think it’s an intentional error explained on the next page?

Bob Cull

John will have to explain the weather or not question for you, he did the research on this one, not me.

http://www.facebook.com/evilliberalagenda John Prager

There’s really not much to go on. This just popped up. One comment suggested it was from an English textbook from South Korea, which makes sense with the “grammar point.” One way or another, it’s sickening.

I was taught the same thing in one Christian school, though.My guess is that it’s a religious school’s textbook.

Bob

Apollo 11 was the name of the entire mission, the command module was named Columbia, when the lunar module landed they named it Eagle, as in “Houston, Tranquility base here. The Eagle has landed”

Andrew Marks

Not to mention the fact that Michael Collins did not land on the moon; he stayed in the orbiter. As for the “myths” about the moon landing, Myth-Busters did a fantastic episode dedicated to busting them. Check it out.

http://facebook sotamis

WOW! raising the next generation of conspiracy theorists. Wonder if when they get to college they can pick their major. Birther, radical muslim, Benghazi and so on.

Chris

I started out going to a Southern Baptist Christian school with the A BEKA crap. Fortunately I only had to endure 2 years of Kindergarden (K4, K5), First, and Second grades. I was definitely behind my public school peers when I started third grade. I’m not sure what the grammar point is supposed to be about. Whether and Weather are easily confused.

Science is science ,religion is religion. In Catholic school Religion is a course(mandatory) albeit only a half an hour course daily . All other courses were taught according to regional school standards. No electives were offered ,we had Physed and Health, health was taught when it was too cold to go outside, but shop,auto mechanics was not offered. Just college prep. curriculum. Now “Christian” schools (I’m guessing) maybe don’t have the same standards, more of an agenda. But I’m just guessing, isn’t it a sin to do anything bad to kids? I mean even more so than just being bad, like there is a special place in hell for this alleged Christian type teaching?

kitcumbie

When you live your life enmeshed in an ideology that encourages you to believe in fantasy it helps to believe in lies in your waking real life. Zealots can never be argues with because they lack the ability to even conceive the truth.

Shane

I was practically raised on A BEKA and so were my siblings. we were homeschooled a lot and I was homeschooled the longest out of all of them. I remember walking into high school and feeling extremely ignorant compared to everyone else based on the material being taught (specifically in biology and world history). ironically I learned grammar the best from that program

fortunately for me I was able to break out of that indoctrination pretty quickly (I am 18 right now). I’m still a Christian but I value proper education

will

Who could hate their children so much to subject them to this?

Bob Cull

It isn’t hatred that drives these people to teach their children this stuff, Will, it is ignorance. They honestly believe that passing their ignorance on to another generation is the right thing to do. Sadly, too many of these ignoramuses actually vote and they vote for the corporate owned scum buckets who tell them what they want to hear, that they believe the same things even though they don’t, they only want to protect the deep pockets who are making them richer.

http://twitter.com/deuZige deuZige (@deuZige)

Ignorance is not knowing. Ignorance cannot be passed on. This is something else. This is teaching children lies and teaching children facts are lies. If this is done out of a conscious conviction and rationalized belief then it should not be regarded as hate. It is only hate when one’s consciously and knowingly doing something to someone knowing it is wrong and or will hurt the subject of your actions.
It is evil when it is wrong and or hurting someone….
Get the difference i’m trying to get across?

Bob Cull

I am fully aware of what ignorance is Deusige. Ignorance cannot be inherited in the same way stupidity can but it most certainly CAN be passed on and that is what anyone sending their child to a school, or through home “schooling,” which teaches them this garbage.

https://www.facebook.com/skip.moreland.5 Skip Moreland

I guess I was lucky. I went to catholic school for 10 grades (this was before the moon landing.), but I was taught science. In fact It helped me love science more than I did reading about it on my own. I learned basic biology and evolution. Of course this was in a northern liberal state, so that probably had something to do with it. I didn’t even know that so many people were opposed to evolution until after high school. And the flag did not flutter, it had a rod in it to straighten it out so it wouldn’t droop. And of course in a low gravity, once the flag was planted it would move because of inertia. But it was not because of ‘wind’.

Jeff Simpson

Can you cite the name and publisher of this textbook? I’d love to get a copy.

John Prager

I can’t find it. Tried. I know it’s something I was taught, but I can’t identify the book.

Bob

In a way all the parents allowing their children grow up ignorant are doing society a service in providing a ready work force for the fast food, and janitorial industries.. :)

Ceecee Doubledee

It is not correct in the grammar point section however. I believe that is what the author was attempting to convey.

http://gravatar.com/vrswesley vrswesley

Im a christian but was taught in public school…almost cant believe you were taught this stuff..Im sorry.

http://gravatar.com/skewednotions Mary Ann Peden-Coviello

I agree with you on all of this except one thing. “Weather” would have been incorrect. The textbook is, in fact, correct in its use of “whether.”

boB

Did you notice the “Grammar Point” from the textbook? THAT would be the “weather” mentioned and the textbook is, in fact, absolutely incorrect in its usage.

https://www.facebook.com/DelmoreCobb Chip Cobb

Look at the very bottom of the page in the section marked “grammar point.”

will

You were right, but they thought they were wrong.

http://www.facebook.com/evilliberalagenda John Prager

I’d suggest you re-check how they spelled it, Mary Ann :)

Jen

I grew up like you did, I went to a Christian Private school that used A Beka curriculum. Now in my 40’s I feel cheated out of a scientific education, I can only recall taking biology and it was of course Bible based crap. I learn what I can but I made sure not to do this to my own kids. I push science education and they know why I do, too.

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